Students analyze actual local and global issues and organizational problems to identify underlying leadership issues, as well as to develop research protocols and arguments focused on helping to resolve those issues. Students are challenged to think critically to construct cogent analyses based on their knowledge of leadership theories and systems theory, as well as on their understanding of place as process. By the conclusion of the course, students identify a preliminary capstone project topic that meets the capstone project requirements outlined in the Spalding University Ed. D.: Leadership Handbook and in the Spalding University Catalog.

Upon completion of this course, students will be able to:

• Critically examine leadership issues to hypothesize their underlying origin.
• Conduct a literature review to focus on resolving one leadership issue.
• Articulate their own research question and critically assess their own and their classmates’ preliminary research questions.
• Outline a research plan that may help solve the problem.